Looper Review

This is a response to the few negative reviews of Looper I have seen as I thought Looper was great and that the negative reviews seem to be based on people needing everything explained to them (Spoiler Warning!!!!!!).

Looper was a fantastic, sleek, smart Sci-Fi/Action film with an amazing premise. I mean could you kill your future self?! The thing I loved most was that there was no Inception like 30 minute intro explaining everything (don’t get me wrong I loved Inception) and when any character asks about time travel the subject is dismissed with a “it will fry your brain” response.

This was a film about story and character not about the mechanics of time travel.

The reason I decided to review Looper is because a few reviews have reminded me that I’m fed up of this culture where people want a film to explain everything to them, I think it’s fine when a film leaves certain things up in the air. It’s never said, but, it’s quite obvious the Rainmaker is closing the loops because he has no need for Loopers. He’s taken over the mob and is capable of disposing of the bodies himself (by destroying them on a molecular level) so why would he have to send them back in time? I’ve already pointed out that I actually thought it was GOOD that they didn’t go into detail about how time travel works. I’d rather a film focused it’s attention on story and character as well as giving us the occasional mind blowing action set piece!

I loved all the stuff on the farm, Rian Johnson has a habit of slowing things down in the second act, watch Brick and Brothers Bloom and you’ll see it there as well.

Sometimes filmmakers want you to fill in a few dots yourself, which I’m more than fine with, I understand why some people want to go to a film and not have to do any work, but to those people I say, just because a film doesn’t spell it all out for you doesn’t mean it’s a BAD film it just means the filmmaker is treating you like an equal rather than an idiot, which is what most blockbuster films seem to think we are these days.

All in all I’d say it’s the best action/blockbuster film of the year by quite a distance and I cannot wait for Rian Johnson’s future work.

One response to “Looper Review”

I haven’t yet seen “Looper”, but I’ve heard really good things so far. It is one of those movies that my first impression after hearing about the premise was “this is either going to be really good or really bad”. When you get into the sci/fi, fantasy, space, or time travel genres it seems movies are at one end of the spectrum or the other. There aren’t many that land in that middle “it was okay” area because they, by necessity, sink or swim largely on believability of the mechanics of the universe within which they are set. “In Time” is a good example of a movie being on the really bad end of the spectrum because it never seemed to know which direction it wanted to go in.

I completely agree that it is okay for the filmmakers to not spell out every little detail of a movie because it makes the films much more engaging and thought provoking. But what I do ask of a good filmmaker is that they understand and have answers for things woven into the design of the film so that even if they leave things up to the audience to figure out they are things that can be figured out. I take this approach in my own writing. I might not explain everything, but you can bet I’d have the answer if you asked. I just like to think people are smart enough to get there on their own.